Will Smith Trivia
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60 free Will Smith trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
52 free Will Smith trivia questions with answers. Will Smith has been famous for four decades in three different jobs: the teenage rapper who won the first-ever rap Grammy, the sitcom star of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and the box-office king of the late 1990s and 2000s. This quiz covers all of it. Fifty questions run from his West Philadelphia childhood and the DJ Jazzy Jeff years through Bad Boys, Independence Day, Men in Black, Ali, Hitch, The Pursuit of Happyness, I Am Legend and Hancock, up to King Richard, the Best Actor Oscar and the slap that overshadowed it. The easy questions ask which sitcom made him a star and who his Men in Black partner was; the hard ones want the sitcom theme he sampled on his first single, the size of his 1980s tax bill, the role he turned down that went to Keanu Reeves and the stunt he pulled for his 50th birthday. It works for movie nights, 90s parties and anyone who can still rap the Fresh Prince theme from memory. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on Will Smith, his films and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and each question carries the sentence that backs it up.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which US city was Will Smith born?
Philadelphia
Philadelphia's west side is where he grew up, and he later wrote that childhood into the lyrics of the Fresh Prince theme song, which he performed himself.
Q 02What first name is Will Smith's 'Will' short for?
Willard
Willard, not William: he was named Willard Carroll Smith after his father and passed the name on to his eldest son, who goes by Trey.
Q 03The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, which launched Will Smith's acting career in 1990, aired on which network?
NBC
NBC built the show around him at a moment when he was broke and being chased by the IRS.
Q 04Who was Will Smith's DJ and producer in his hip-hop duo?
DJ Jazzy Jeff
DJ Jazzy Jeff, born Jeffrey Townes, followed his partner into television too: he produced the Fresh Prince theme song that Smith wrote and rapped.
Q 05Which song by Will Smith's hip-hop duo won the first-ever Grammy for Best Rap Performance?
Parents Just Don't Understand
Parents Just Don't Understand won in 1989, but Smith stayed away from the ceremony in protest because the new rap award was not going to be shown on television.
Q 06Will Smith's debut single, 'Girls Ain't Nothing but Trouble', sampled which TV show's theme song?
I Dream of Jeannie
I Dream of Jeannie's theme runs through the 1986 single, which had been a radio hit for about a month before Smith even graduated from high school.
Q 07Roughly how big was the tax debt the IRS assessed against Will Smith around 1990?
$2.8 million
$2.8 million was the bill after he spent freely and underpaid his income taxes; the IRS took many of his possessions and garnished his income.
Q 08Which 1997 solo album was Will Smith's debut and went nine times platinum?
Big Willie Style
Big Willie Style was his first album in four years, after he had put music aside for film and television, and it reached the top ten in both the US and the UK.
Q 09Which single gave Will Smith his first Billboard Hot 100 number one, in 1998?
Gettin' Jiggy wit It
Gettin' Jiggy wit It spent three weeks at number one; his Men in Black theme had never entered the Hot 100 because it was not sold as a single in the US.
Q 10Will Smith famously turned down which role, which went to Keanu Reeves?
Neo in The Matrix
Neo in The Matrix went to Reeves after Smith doubted the effects-heavy pitch could work on screen; he later said Reeves played the part better than he would have.
Q 11Which Christopher Nolan film did Will Smith turn down because he did not understand the story?
Inception
Inception was offered to him first, he revealed in 2025, but he 'didn't get it'; the lead went to Leonardo DiCaprio, and Smith said the miss still hurts.
Q 12Will Smith co-starred with Martin Lawrence in which 1995 action film?
Bad Boys
Bad Boys was Michael Bay's first feature; made for about $20 million, it grossed $141 million and grew into a four-film series.
Q 13Which Miami narcotics detective does Will Smith play opposite Martin Lawrence in four action films?
Mike Lowrey
Mike Lowrey gets a stand-in in the first film: the captain orders his partner, family man Marcus Burnett, to impersonate him so a murder witness will keep talking.
Q 21In Hitch, what does Will Smith's character do for a living?
Coaches men on dating
Hitch coaches men on dating as New York's secretive 'date doctor', only to find his own methods fail on the gossip columnist he falls for.
Q 22Which real person did Will Smith play in The Pursuit of Happyness?
Chris Gardner
Chris Gardner, the salesman who went from homelessness to a brokerage career, has a cameo in the final scene, walking past Smith and his on-screen son.
Q 23In The Pursuit of Happyness, what does Will Smith's character solve in a taxi to impress a manager?
A Rubik's Cube
Q 14In Independence Day, what military role does Will Smith's Captain Steven Hiller hold?
Marine fighter pilot
Marine fighter pilot Hiller dreams of becoming an astronaut and gets to space the hard way: he volunteers to fly a captured alien craft up to the mothership.
Q 15Who plays Agent K opposite Will Smith's Agent J in Men in Black?
Tommy Lee Jones
Tommy Lee Jones was the director's choice: Barry Sonnenfeld says the studio wanted Clint Eastwood, who reportedly passed, and that he asked for Jones instead.
Q 16Which company bought the publisher of The Men in Black, the comic behind Will Smith's film?
Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics bought Malibu, whose Aircel imprint had published Lowell Cunningham's series in 1990, so the comic was a Marvel title by the time the film came out.
Q 17Which Will Smith film won five Golden Raspberry Awards including Worst Picture?
Wild Wild West
Wild Wild West pitted Smith's government agent against a giant mechanical spider, and he has since called the film a thorn in his side.
Q 18In Enemy of the State, Will Smith plays a man in which profession?
Labor lawyer
Labor lawyer Robert Clayton Dean becomes the target of a covert surveillance operation after he is unknowingly handed evidence of a political assassination.
Q 19In which 1993 film does Will Smith play a con man who charms wealthy New Yorkers?
Six Degrees of Separation
Six Degrees of Separation gave him his first major film role; its plot drew on David Hampton, a real con man who talked his way into Manhattan homes in the 1980s.
Q 20Which boxer did Will Smith portray in a 2001 Michael Mann biopic?
Muhammad Ali
Muhammad Ali's decade from beating Sonny Liston to the Rumble in the Jungle fills the film; Smith gained weight and trained like a boxer, and earned his first Oscar nomination.
A Rubik's Cube solved during a shared cab ride wins him the manager's attention, but he then has to bolt without paying the fare.
Q 24Which of Will Smith's children played his son in The Pursuit of Happyness?
Jaden
Jaden made his film debut in the role, and his father later came up with the story for After Earth, in which the two played father and son again.
Q 25What breed is Sam, the dog who keeps Will Smith's Robert Neville company in I Am Legend?
German Shepherd
German Shepherd Sam, played by two dogs named Abbey and Kona, is a parting gift from Neville's young daughter and becomes his only companion in deserted Manhattan.
Q 26Which of Will Smith's children appeared as his daughter in I Am Legend?
Willow
Willow made her film debut as Marley in the film's flashbacks, and three years later scored a hit single of her own with 'Whip My Hair'.
Q 27Who plays Mary, the wife of the PR man Will Smith's superhero rescues in Hancock?
Charlize Theron
Charlize Theron's Mary turns out to share Hancock's powers, and the two become more mortal the closer they stay to each other.
Q 28Which DC villain did Will Smith play in Suicide Squad (2016)?
Deadshot
Deadshot was the part Smith said he picked over a return in Independence Day: Resurgence, a sequel that was in production at the same time.
Q 29In Concussion, Will Smith plays the doctor who first identified which condition in American football players?
Chronic traumatic encephalopathy
Chronic traumatic encephalopathy was known in boxers before Bennet Omalu found it in former Steeler Mike Webster; Smith hesitated over the film until he met him.
Q 30Which Will Smith film became his first to gross over $1 billion worldwide?
Aladdin
Aladdin overtook Independence Day as his biggest hit; Smith said he was 'terrified' of following Robin Williams as the Genie before making the role his own.